birthdays, too,
hold misunderstood questions
alongside bright smile greetings.
at the end of the day,
I stayed late at the Temple
to water Roshi’s flowers.
oceans of bright clouds,
oceans of solemn clouds.
—
The final couplet comes from the words of Dogen in our school’s translation of the Ninth Precept.
It has been twenty of your birthdays
since I first saw you walking
in the afternoon light;
you slipped away for a time,
but later
we floated in the
midnight darkness of the lake,
timidly watched the sunrise
from granite steps.
This day bears little resemblance
outside the presence of you and I
and want of a breeze;
others in between are half-forgotten,
depending on photos in an album
to remind us —
yet still I see you walking
and wish you might come
to sit down beside me.
